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Saturday, February 19, 2011

Two news items from the Gulf of Aden

On February 15, Rear Admiral Zhang Huachen, commander of the 7th Chinese naval escort taskforce implementing escort mission in the Gulf of Aden and the waters off the Somali coast, and his party boarded the Spanish naval escort frigate “Canary Islands”, the flagship of the No. 465 naval escort taskforce of the European Union （EU） to have a meeting and exchange with Juan Rodriguez, commander of the EU No. 465 naval escort taskforce on the sea upon invitation.

By Fan Junwei

Chinese naval escort taskforce rescues ROK merchant ship

(Source: PLA Daily) 2011-02-12

On the evening of February 10, local time, the Chinese naval escort taskforce on escort mission in the Gulf of Aden and the waters off the Somali coast dispatched a ship-borne helicopter and successfully rescued a merchant ship from the Republic of Korea (ROK) chased and attacked by quite a few pirate boats.

At 12:30 of February 10, local time (17:30, Beijing time), the seventh Chinese naval escort taskforce accomplished the 294th escort mission in which it successfully escorted 11 merchant ships to the termination point in the western waters of the Gulf of Aden.

At 17:18, the ROK merchant ship "CS DAISY" sent SOS to the Chinese naval escort taskforce, indicating that it was under the chase of quite a few boats.

In response the command post of the Chinese naval escort taskforce immediately ordered the “Xuzhou” warship about 40 nautical miles away from the scene of incident to speed to the "CS DAISY". At 17:46, the ship-borne helicopter of the "Xuzhou" warship carrying three special operation members took off and showed up in the sky above the "CS DAISY" 20 minutes later.

The helicopter hovered above the "CS DAISY", sending warnings to the pirate boats. More than 20 minutes later, the "CS DAISY" sailed out of the dangerous waters. The helicopter didn’t return to the "Xuzhou" warship until it ensured that there was no suspicious sign around and no danger lurking in the sea area for all merchant ships.

After the event the Chinese naval escort taskforce received a letter of gratitude from its ROK counterpart.